


At The Pre-Dawn Past

by Sundown_Winter



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Fire, Hostage Situations, Lots of fucking fire, M/M, So not canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-25
Updated: 2015-11-25
Packaged: 2018-05-03 07:10:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5281520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sundown_Winter/pseuds/Sundown_Winter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This will make no sense to most people, it's a gift for presidentwarden and features our long-developed AU of the Dragon Age world, with original characters and other critters in places they shouldn't be and expies of people you might recognize from other medias.</p><p>But if you want to try and read it anyway, Danarius shows up at Soldier's Peak to try and reclaim Thazulok, a mage he once experimented on in ways similar to Fenris, and the fight from the denizens within to stop him.</p><p>I know the title is shite I'm sorry :p</p>
            </blockquote>





	At The Pre-Dawn Past

**Author's Note:**

  * For [presidentwarden (herrcolonel)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=presidentwarden+%28herrcolonel%29).



Alma couldn’t say that Cole’s new method of waking people up in the morning was much of an improvement on simply popping into rooms out of thin air.

“Alma!  Alma wake up!  I need you to wake up!”  There was a cacophonous thudding as he sounded to be hitting and kicking the door frantically, making as much of a racket as possible.  “I can not come in but I need you to wake up!”

“...I’m going to kill him…” Johanna’s voice came through a pillow at Alma’s side, the dark-haired elf having pulled it over her face.  “Figure out where you want his ashes spread.  He’s dead as soon as I manage to get up.”

Alma just reached over to pat at the pillow over Johanna’s face, her own eyes only open enough to determine it was still dark outside, pre-dawn.  Entirely too early for the young spirit boy to be up to these sorts of antics, and yet there he was.  “Cole, you can come in,” she called, trying not to sound as exhausted and annoyed as she really was.

“If you want this pillow crammed up your-,”

“Johanna.”  Alma pushed herself to sit up, brushing her hair out of her face, as the door flew open, and Cole rushed in, colliding with the bed in his hurry.  “Cole, calm down.  What in the world-,”

“They’re coming!  They’re coming, they’re almost here, we have to get up, we have to get up before they get here!”  He was all but jumping up and down where he stood, hair askew and eyes wide with what looked like genuine fear.  Considering Cole usually announced everything, no matter how serious, as though he were reading it off a piece of paper, this definitely caught her attention.

“Who’s coming?  What are you talking about?” Alma asked, even as she was tossing the blankets aside to get to her feet, having to lightly push Cole aside so she could get out of bed, brushing off her nightgown as she did.

“Men...bad men, an army of bad men, they’re coming, they’re coming to this place!”

“Army?”  Johanna finally lifted the pillow to squint a little blearily at Cole.  “Did Tavish keep you up with his ghost stories again?”

“Tavish is gone, Johanna, as are half of our group.  Trying to recruit in Redcliffe, remember.”  Entirely too far away to be of any help, though she didn’t speak that out loud.  Alma reached out to take hold of Cole’s hands, trying to settle him down enough to get something of sense out of him.  “Cole, tell me.  What bad men?  What do they want?”

“The mage...the mage, they follow the mage, he’s...he knows us, saw us, followed...Gwaren, saw them in Gwaren, said the spies, the elf, fiery elf, mine, back to be mine again, tracked him here, tracked him down at last…”

“Fiery elf?  Well there’s pretty much one option there.”  Johanna sat up, rubbing at her face and slapping it lightly to wake herself up.

“Cole, listen to me.”  Alma reached up to grip his chin as gently but firmly as she could manage to secure his attention.  “Are you absolutely sure of this?  These men are coming?”

“Yes!  They’re almost here, they want to hurt us!”

Alma nodded again. “All right, I need you to help now.  Ignore the ribbons just this once.  Wake up everyone and tell them to meet in the main foyer for battle.  Then I need you to go look at the outer defenses and be sure that they’re all in place, can you do that?  You’re the only one of us that can get outside and back in safely.”

“I-yes.  I will help.”

“All right, dear, now go, as fast as you can.”

Cole nodded quickly, then turned to rush out of the room, already yelling at the top of his lungs again.  Well, everyone did need to be awake.

“Get your armor on and let’s go,” Alma said to Johanna, already rushing to do that herself.  “Whatever this is, we’re going to meet it with force.”

( )

It was clear that no one had been exceptionally thrilled to be yanked awake just before dawn by a screaming spirit, but Alma was pleased to see that everyone had taken the message seriously, and were gathered in the foyer, dressed hastily in whatever armor they had handy and with their weapons prepared.  Only Scout was still in his nightclothes, but he had a whimpering Alain in his arms and his crossbow on its holster across his back, pacing back and forth to soothe the crying baby.

“What is this about, Alma?” Loghain asked, as their leader marched into the room and without a word, shoved a bow and a quiver of arrows into his hands.  “I-what-?”

“Cole senses an army approaching us with intent on attack.  He is outside making sure our defenses are secure and we will treat this as a siege.  We’re going to the top of the walls to fight from there as much as possible.  We can not allow whoever this is to get inside our home without earning that right.”

“And we are taking the word of the insane spirit?” Zevran asked, raising an eyebrow, still rubbing a little sleepily at his eyes.

“Thazulok?”

The small elf mage gave her a bit of a sour expression, even for him, but then sighed, closing his eyes and crossing his arms.  Alma watched, waiting as he used the powers he had gained over years of effort to try and sense if there was more of a presence outside.

“This is silly,” Zhaana said grumpily, arms crossed.  “If there is threat, then we go and crush them.”

“All of us ain’t as capable as you in that,” Dell answered, the dwarf holding a bag full of clanking metal tools in one hand and his trusty giant hammer in the other.  “I’m just glad I’ve kept the ballistas in workin’ order.”

“They are out there!” Thazulok suddenly said, eyes popping open, and a look of what could only be called distress coming to his face.  “Men...dozens of men, mages, mercenaries...they are coming and...and they are looking for me!”

“What?  Why would they be looking for you?” Myrdo asked, stepping closer to the elf.

“The man in front knows him,” came the familiar airy voice, and the group all looked up to see Cole seated on a rafter, nervously kicking his feet, eyes distant as they were when he was picking up on something.  “Property, my property, I can continue my work, I can get back all the investment, all this will pay off, finally, finally, mine again.”

Thazulok’s face fell, everything about his posture taking on what could only be described as pure terror.  “Danarius…”

“Gwaren, reports there, elves, two elves, one of them white-haired and magical, must be him, must be, follow, follow him back, go to retrieve him, bring him back, finish my work…”  Cole shook out his head, grimacing.  “The outer defenses seem intact Alma.”

“Good, good, thank you Cole.”  Alma looked to Thazulok, then shook her head, speaking to the others.  “Then we know what we’re facing.  A lot of our forces are in Redcliffe so we’re running short-handed, but we can do this.”  She pointed around to all of them.  “We’ve had drills for this, we know what to do.  Heavy and Dell, you two are manning the ballistas.  Zevran and Johanna are running ammo and supplies for the rest of us.  Archers in the corners, mages in the centers, Josef and Thaz, you two are on offense, Zhaana, defense.  Myrdo-,”

“I know what to do,” the warrior said, with a bit of an odd expression on his face, even as he reached over to put a hand on Thaz’s shoulder.

“I’ve gotta-,” Scout started to say, but Alma simply waved him off.

“Just stay armed.  We’ll be able to bottleneck it so there shouldn’t be any large masses getting inside the castle, so pick off any that get by.  Otherwise, stay put and mix potions and prep ammunition.”

“I can do that.”  Scout nodded, bouncing Alain a bit, the baby finally starting to settle somewhat.  “Just try not to let too many of them get in here.”

( )

The sun had almost reached past the horizon, all the skies orange and pink with the coming dawn, as the intruders could finally be heard.  Alma and Loghain had long ago made preparations for an attack on the Peak, which meant that for the time being, the two gates into the courtyard were opened, and their group was stationed atop the stairwell leading to the main entrance to the castle, along the ramparts and hoods, close enough to defend, high enough to avoid being easily wiped out.

“Be ready to dispel anything that’s coming,” Alma was saying to Loghain, last minute instructions.  “There’s at least a few mages and if they set off any large area spells, destroy them.  You three,” she looked to Josef, Zhaana, and Thazulok, “-be aware that if any dangerous spells hit us, he’s going to dispel everything.  Duck until you can cast again.”

“I will stay to rear and keep up shields,” Zhaana said, nodding a little.  Josef was busy rolling up the sleeves of his robe, a small knife already in the holster of his belt, ready for blood magic if need be.  Thaz still seemed largely shell-shocked, but he managed a dismissive wave of his hand at her questioning glare.

“I want to help,” Alma heard, and she was already shaking her head as she turned to Cole, who was clutching at a pair of daggers and staring right in her eyes.

“You’ve already done enough.  You warned us so that we had enough time to get out here and get ourselves set to fight.  You can’t fight them with daggers from up here and I will not send you down to the grounds by yourself.”

“I can be hard to see, and I can kill them!  I’ve killed enough people before!”

“Absolutely not.  You go downstairs with Scout and the Drydens where it’s safe.”  She reached out to put a hand on his shoulder.  “You have helped.  You have.”

Cole shook his head.  “No!  I can help-!”

“Listen to me, Cole,” Johanna broke in, putting her arm around his shoulders to quickly escort him off and away from Alma.  “When she tells you what to do, you need to go and do it, got it?  She’s the leader for a reason.  Believe me, I would rather be down there on the ground sticking my axes in necks than just running for arrows, but that’s just how this plan goes.”

“But you don’t understand!  I have to help!”

“Look, we will have a long, loud fight about this after we all survive this fucking magister, but right now I do not have time.”  She put a hand square in the middle of his back and shoved him at the door.  “Get in there!”

Cole might have actually made a bit of a huffing sound, but turned and just marched himself through the door and back into the castle, and Johanna just rolled her eyes and headed back to the front of the ramparts, looking down at the gate, seeing the men marching up towards it.

There was an older mage leading the pack, and just the sight of him made Alma’s skin crawl, even as she was getting her crossbow upholstered and ready.  He had an unkempt gray beard and slicked-back hair, his face showed more age than she would have thought would be possible for a man still upright and leading armies.  She found herself glancing unbidden towards Josef, noted in their group for being in unusually good shape for his age, and grimaced slightly.  Josef was a blood mage, and once had been the most powerful mage she’d known, and he had used his magic on himself to maintain his health in spite of his age.  If this man had done the same, anywhere even close to the level Josef had once been at, they were in trouble.

“Ah, Wardens,” the man called up to them, stopping just inside the gate, the men following him spreading out in an obvious means of surrounding their fortifications.  “I see you anticipated my arrival.  I suspect that means you had someone skilled at sensing the presence of others...perhaps through detecting their emotions?”

“Not who you would expect...Danarius, was it?” Alma answered coolly.  “I’ve heard some stories about you.  Funny, they made you sound more fearsome.  I suppose tales do become tall after enough tellings.”

“And you must be Alma Tabris, the great Hero of Fereldan.”  Danarius turned his head to look over the entire group of people standing at the top of the barricade, and his gaze stopped on the white-haired elf, practically cowering behind one of the spires alongside the stairwell.  “And there you are, little Thazulok.”

Thaz cringed back slightly, even as Loghain stepped forward and into Danarius’s line of sight, already notching an arrow into the bow he was holding, a low growl in his voice.  “This is our home you have intruded on, mage, as well as a stronghold of the Wardens.  Word has already been sent to Denerim and my daughter will hunt you to the ends of the planet, assuming you were even able to best us here.”

“Pardon me if I do not tremble with fear at the thought of the army of Fereldan coming for me,” Danarius responded with a slight smirk.  “Once I am done here I will be taking my property back to Tevinter with me, and any intrusion on Fereldan’s part will be recognized as the act of war that it would be.”

“Not if Weisshaupt realizes one of our Wardens has been stolen and enslaved by a magister.  Though none of this matters in the first place,” Alma answered.  “You are not going to be taking any of my people.  Turn, take your men, and leave now, and this won’t have to end in bloodshed.”

“Tempting.  Especially considering the bounty I do see before me.”  Danarius’s smirk somehow managed to grow even more predatory.  Qunari, mages, dwarves...just think of what I could learn with the lot of you as my experiments.”

There was a loud SHUNK from the far end of the platform, and the intruder looked over to see Dell had just aimed and loaded the ballista, and was holding the trigger in one hand, scowling behind his dark goggles.  “You’ll have to pardon me if I don’t much appreciate the idea of gettin’ experimented on by the likes’a you.  This is your last warnin’.  Leave in one piece or leave in several.  Your call.”

Danarius spared an eyebrow for the dwarf’s threat, before the infuriating smirk returned, and he shifted his grip on his staff.  “That would be a problem, if I were at all-,”

Literally between words, there was an interruption in Danarius’s boasting, as a burst of noise and mist materialized between him and the ramparts, and before the magister could even start to turn in its direction, there was the THWACK of fist meeting jaw, sending the older mage toppling to the ground in a heap.

“Myrdo!” Thaz shouted, as the group could see that indeed, the Fadewalker had just used his ability to get up close and personal in the blink of an eye.

The man in question was actually shaking out his fist, glaring down at the mage who was still recovering from the force of the sudden blow, ignoring the soldiers who were already brandishing their own weapons at the sudden attack.  “You will take Thazulok over my dead body,” he said, voice as evenly toned as ever, despite reaching back to draw the saw swords from their holsters on his back.  “Leave this place or be destroyed.”

Danarius had regained his bearings, and the rage on his face was clear for all to say even as he got back to his feet.  “How dare you put your hands on me, savage??  I am a Tevinter magister, and I-!”

Myrdo abruptly vanished from sight again, but this time Danarius knew it was coming, and swirled around to get his staff up and block the sword coming for his neck.  “Your status does not matter to me,” Myrdo said through gritted teeth, stepping back to keep his balance when the mage pushed him away with a surprising amount of force.  “You will not take him from me.”

“Take him from you, is it?”  Danarius’s eyes narrowed even as a noxious grin came to his face.  “Is that what the situation is here, then?  I think I do understand.”

“Myrdo, get away from him!” Thaz called out frantically, leaning against the railing of their perch, even as Zevran grabbed his shoulder to keep him from actually charging the field.

“I am going to enjoy this far more than I expected, I think,” Danarius said, almost casually-before whipping his staff down and into position, firing off a bolt of sizzling white energy right at his opponent.  Myrdo vanished from sight again just before it would have struck him, reappearing on the other side of the mage and swinging again, just missing as Danarius managed to step forward and out of range.

“The hell with this,” Dell muttered from where he was standing, yanking at the control of the ballista.  “Fire in the hole!”

“Attack now!” Alma called out, even as the dwarf sent a missile careening into the group of warriors that Danarius had brought with him, sending enough of them flying through the air.  “Everyone with everything you’ve got!”

She hardly needed to give the order.  Loghain had already let an arrow fly, piercing through the shoulder of one of the other mages that had started to prepare some sort of spell, sending the man to the ground.  She aimed her own crossbow for the warrior leading a charge of soldiers towards their stronghold, aiming lower and putting the bolt in the man’s leg, leaving him to trip and stumble, bringing down a couple of his brethren with him.

Danarius’s rogues were launching arrows for them as well, but before any could hit, a shimmering blue dome swirled into being in front of them. Zhaana was foregoing use of a staff, just holding up her hands glowing with energy to keep the shield up against the initial hail.  The second it was clear, she dropped it, allowing another launch of projectiles from the ballistas and archers.

Josef didn’t spare any effort to protect himself, running and leaping up and onto the edge of the barricade, the dark wood of his staff already dripping with blood running from his sliced palm.  There wasn’t any elegance to the motion, he all but stabbed the rod in the direction of the nearest enemies, all of whom found themselves screaming in pain even as they whipped about and turned their weapons against their fellows.  Any of them who turned their attention to the blood mage found themselves quickly being attacked by others, howling from agony as they were forced to become ground troops for the very people they had been hired to slaughter.

“Thazulok, start burning people!” Johanna shouted, even as she was helping Heavy to shove another missile into the ballista the giant Qunari was firing off into the army.  “Earn your freakin’ keep!”

Thazulok was still staring at the war going on between two men in the midst of everything else.  Danarius was throwing spells in every attempt he could make to stop the warrior, and Myrdo was jumping and vanishing through the Fade, trying to land a decisive blow against the mage.  They seemed nearly deadlocked, even with the occasional archer or other mage trying to interfere, only to get cut down either by Myrdo himself or picked off by one of Loghain or Alma’s arrows.  The only interruption came when an explosion from one of Dell’s missiles went off too close, knocking both men aside and to the ground, but both were up and fighting again nearly immediately, swords and staff clanging together, hisses of magic and the occasional fluttering wisps fleeing in an accidental pull through the Veil as Myrdo moved through it.

“I need to help him!” Thaz said, tightening his fingers on the barricade.  “He can’t win this fight!”

“I think killing everyone else around him would be a help!” Zevran shouted, sprinting past with an armful of lyrium potions.

“Thazulok, we need your help to hold this position!” Alma said, glancing over to him even as she was pulling another bolt into place on her crossbow.  “Give Myrdo at least the advantage of a one-on-one fight until we can assist him!”

Thaz looked over to her, then flinched when a blue shield popped into existence in front of him, stopping an ice blast from another mage.  “Oh…”  Thaz narrowed his eyes, shaking his head, even as Zhaana’s shield vanished, and the mage in question had to dodge a bolt aiming for his head.  “Right.  Right.”

Alma and Loghain didn’t even need a warning, both taking a couple steps away from the elf as he closed his eyes, reaching back for his own stave.  The red sphere at the top began to glow as he adjusted his grip a moment, and then he opened his eyes, the glow in them flaring brighter for an instant.

The area around their ramparts erupted into flames, not close enough to touch them, but high enough and far enough that the few soldiers that had gotten close were immediately immolated, barely having a chance to scream before they were wreathed in flame.  Most were able to flee out of range, but a few were brought down almost before they realized it was happening.

“Good work, let us see what I can add to it!”  Josef spun his staff around, holding up his bloody hand, red smoke coming off it, and as bodies fell, they would soon rise again, shuddering and jerky with the motion but no less active for it, pulled and pushed by the blood remaining inside them.  These zombies joined their still-living controlled brethren, though these added a degree of horror to the battle, as even the dead themselves, some still aflame, opposed the army trying to sack the castle.

“See, this is what I was concerned about back in Redcliffe,” Zevran, stopping beside Alma to look down at the burning zombies charging into battle.

Alma took this in and considered for a moment that as much as Josef’s former power levels might have been more useful in this situation, she was glad regardless.  Seeing what he could do even after having lost the majority of his magic was frightening enough.

“Alma!”  She whipped her head around at the call, and saw Loghain, alarm in his eyes, pointing out towards the battle.  Josef’s puppets were keeping a lot of the soldiers at bay, even as more soldiers were coming through the gates.  But some of the men in the back, nowhere yet near the fight, were dropping, one after another, crumpling to the ground with throats slit or blood pouring from wounds in their back.  Some of the others around them were swinging swords wildly, or running about in a seeming panic, but she, and Loghain as well, could see the perpetrator with no difficulty.

“Cole!”  Alma dropped her bow to one side, watching the spirit seeming to walk unnoticed among the soldiers.  “What is he doing down there??”

“Looks like he’s thinning out the herd for us,” Zevran said, stepping up to grab her bow and put it back in her hands.  “Don’t point him out, Alma, he’s hiding behind that power of his, so long as no one points him out!”

“We can’t leave him down there alone!”

Loghain fired off an arrow into another warrior, then turned to grip her arm.  “He will be fine.  He knows what he’s doing and he can handle himself.  If you want us all to survive this, we have to keep working to finish this fight!  He’ll be alive to scold afterwards!”

Alma shot him as nasty a glare as she ever did, then looked back, lifting her crossbow, waiting on a blue shield in front of her to vanish after blocking an arrow, and buried a bolt in the face of that archer, seconds before Cole was about to put his dagger into the man’s back.  The spirit turned his head to look at her, probably unable to see the scowl on her face from that distance, and merely offered one quick wave before turning around to go after the next person he could see, a swordsman fighting one of Josef’s zombies.

For his part, Loghain simply accepted a new quiver of arrows from Johanna and resumed his own work picking off their enemies.  One of them had to stay focused.

All through this, Danarius and Myrdo’s weapons clashed, both men now vanishing and reappearing across the field, Danarius throwing spells and Myrdo aiming for stabs and slashes at the magister.  Both of them had accidentally killed several of the others around them, soldiers or thralls either way, but neither had managed to land a blow against who they were trying to just yet.  The frustration from Danarius was becoming obvious, though thus far, Myrdo wasn’t showing any sign of anything but a similar growing exhaustion.

A few soldiers had managed to sneak through the line, and Thazulok caught them out of the corner of his eye, tearing his gaze from the battle to aim a blast of flames at them.  Two of them were sent screaming into the snow to try and extinguish the fire, but the other two managed to burst through the barricaded door and rush into the castle.  “Damn!  They’re inside!”

“I wouldn’t worry about that, Thaz!” Johanna said, handing him off a tiny vial of lyrium potion.  “That goes straight into the main room where Scout’s holed up.”

“And how is that supposed to-??”

One of the two men came charging back out of the door, screaming, armor singed badly and what looked like several bolts from a crossbow embedded in joints and panels of it.  Right behind him was Urzara, looking as ferocious as a tiny baby dragon wearing a satiny blue vest could, small bursts of flame coming from her mouth as she was bearing down on the interloper.  Right behind her though came Scout, Alain settled happily in a carrier on his back, one hand still holding his crossbow and the other reaching out to catch Urzara’s vest, drawing her back towards the door and back inside, and the door slammed shut again with no comment at all from the young elf.

“See?  He’s got it handled,” Johanna said, chuckling a bit at the genuinely impressed look on Thaz’s face.

“Gods be with the one still in there,” Thaz answered, blasting the fleeing soldier almost nonchalantly to put him down along with the others.

That second of good cheer vanished nearly immediately when there was a cry from the field behind them, and the two elves both spun around, Thaz rushing towards the rampart and staring down at the scene, praying to whatever gods might be listening that he hadn’t heard what he thought he had.

The gods failed yet again, because Myrdo was down in the snow, clutching at one side, and trying without much luck to get back to his feet, grasping at the sword just out of his reach, as the panting Danarius was gaining a malicious grin, despite his own obvious fatigue.

“Not...not too bad, for one of your type, savage,” the mage said, aiming a bolt to knock the sword further away, advancing cautiously.  “But alas, for naught.”

“You haven’t won yet, mage,” Myrdo spat out, starting to sit up but getting hit with another bolt, more of a glancing shot than any real attempt to hurt, just keeping him on the ground.

“Haven’t I?  Your resistance has been stopped, and with that I will be able to deal with the mage you are working with that is controlling my forces.  Then it is a simple matter to reclaim what I will of the rest.”  He gestured slightly with his staff, smirking, though not letting it point away from Myrdo even for a second.  “The Veil is terribly thin here.  How simple to summon through spirits to help in my measures…”

“You underestimate the power of spirits,” Myrdo said, eyes narrowing.  “And their unwillingness to help the likes of you.”

“Spirits are simple, mindless creatures.  A few whispers in their ears and they can be brought around to nearly any line of thinking.”

“Danarius!  Let him go!” Thaz yelled from the barricade, fear written in his expression.  “He has nothing to do with any of this!”

Danarius didn’t look up, keeping his eye on Myrdo lest the warrior make another charge, but he did raise his voice to be heard.  “And that sounds like my sweet little Thazulok, calling out for me once again.  It has been entirely too long.”

“Do not address him in such a manner!”  Myrdo was moving to try and lunge to his feet again, but another sharp blast put him back to the ground.

“Stop it!  Stop!” Thaz actually seemed like he might be about to actually jump down onto the battlefield itself, if Johanna and Zevran weren’t there to catch him before he could go through with it.  “If you hurt him again I’ll-!”

“The only reason this animal in human skin is in any danger is because of you, Thazulok,” Danarius answered.  “You had a nice safe home, a caring master, and yet you threw it all away, and for what?  This?  You have fallen so far and even now you fight being brought back to your proper place.”

Loghain was quick to line up an arrow and send it flying for the mage, but Danarius was also as quick to raise the hand not handling his staff, an aura of energy rising from the ground around him to stop the weapon just before it could strike.  “If you’re so certain of your superiority, then do not lord your power over a man who already took you to your limit!” Loghain snarled, grabbing for another arrow.

“And you would be one that would know about such a thing, wouldn’t you, Mac Tir?” Danarius seemed to be gathering energy into the staff, sparks and swirls of dark power surrounding it.  “But do not fear, I will put an end to this as you asked.”

“Don’t!  Danarius!”  Thaz was all but crying out at this point.  “Do not hurt him, I beg of you, let him be!”

Danarius’s sinister smile gained a few degrees at that, and he met Myrdo’s eyes.  “It has been a long time since I heard my pet begging as such.  I didn’t realize how much I missed it.”

“He is going to destroy you.  Thazulok has grown in power beyond what you could ever hope to control or contain again.”  Myrdo didn’t flinch from the obvious threat of magic, just matching Danarius’s stare with his own.

“Seeing how obvious his attentions for you are, I suspect you will never know how wrong you were.”  The magic around him abruptly dropped, and the crackling power on the staff increased.  “A little bit of blood magic of my own then, to see you out, Chasind.  To whatever pool of filth inside the Fade spawned a creature like you.”

“Myrdo!” Thazulok thrashed against Zevran and Johanna’s grip.  “Let go, he’s going to kill him, he’s going to-!”

A faint whisper of air moving, a slight shimmer of an aura, was the only sign of anything changing, but just as they saw it, they also saw Cole, stepping out of nothing behind the magister, blades in hand, an uncharacteristically fierce look on his face.  The boy’s clothes were spattered in blood from his work already, but he wasn’t paying attention to any of the soldiers desperately trying to regroup behind their master.  His gaze was locked solely on Danarius, and he charged forward, weapons drawn up, with clear intent on burying his daggers into the intruder’s back.

Danarius had been about to launch whatever spell he had cooked up, but the sudden presence behind him caught his attention.  He spun about, a great deal of the energy dispelling with the loss of focus, but had enough left to raise a hand quickly, a few drops of blood from a sudden wound flying.

Cole’s charge stopped in its tracks just shy of striking, his body suddenly seizing as though struck by a powerful electricity, and a pained scream tore past his lips as he struggled against the magic, unwillingly dropping his weapons to the ground as his hands were forced open.

“Cole!”  It was Alma’s turn to move forward, but she brought herself up short when Myrdo, taking advantage of Danarius’s distraction, managed to roll to the side and snatch up one of his swords.

“You will not hurt anyone else, mage!”  He was on his feet and rushing the man as Cole just had, a roar of fury bellowing out of him.  “I will have your head!”

Danarius glanced over his shoulder at that, and then was moving remarkably quick, especially for a man of such age.  The spell on Cole seemed to drop, but before the spirit could recover his faculties to react, Danarius had grabbed him by the arm, yanking him forward and around to the front, Cole letting out a gasp and squeezing his eyes shut at the abrupt awareness that he had been pushed right into the path of Myrdo’s weapon.

Myrdo had better control than that, but even so, stopping his forward momentum caused him to stagger, trying to keep his balance so as to avoid hurting the boy.  Danarius’s staff came forward at that same instance, and another bolt of energy, using the leftover bits of the previous spell, hit the warrior square in the chest with enough force to launch him backwards off his feet and skidding through the snow.

“Myrdo!”  Cole tried to run forward towards him, but Danarius tightened the grip on his arm and yanked him backwards, bracketing his staff under the boy’s chin to hold him in place as the mage’s other arm clamped around his chest, keeping one arm pinned to his side and holding him there as a shield.  Cole yelped and struggled immediately, trying to work his way free, but the staff drawing up and forcing his head back against Danarius’s shoulder made him have to stop.

“The hell you will!”  Alma had her crossbow up and a bolt going at Danarius’s head so quickly that it had to have been pure instinct, but the staff flared blue and the shield of energy was up again, surrounding he and his hostage to keep the attacks from connecting.  “Damn you!  Stop hiding behind a child and fight!”

“Oh but haven’t we all done enough of fighting for this morning?”  Danarius sneered a bit, tightening his hold on Cole when the spirit squirmed to try and get loose again.  “Now what manner of creature is this, Wardens?  It looks human enough, reacts like one...but this energy.  Like nothing I’ve encountered anywhere outside the Fade…”

Alma didn’t even hesitate to shove away the others.  Most of the soldiers and mages were either dead or had retreated behind their master, and she was breaking down their barricade to get to the field without hesitation.  “You let him go right now or I swear I’ll-,”

The staff against Cole’s throat flared once with a bit of magic, making him cry out again, and Danarius’s expression hardened.  “You’ll do nothing.  This little being reeks of Fade magic, and yet I am not being torn to bits by an angered abomination.”  He let his hold on the staff drop a bit, just enough to let Cole lower his head slightly.  “Whatever this is, I suspect there’s not another one like it to be found, is there?”

Alma was already on the ground, most of her group flanking her, save Heavy and Dell who stayed with their ballistas.  “HE is a little boy, and you are a coward, here trying to steal back a man who was brave enough and strong enough to escape your foul presence.  And you think yourself so powerful?  Your assembled force couldn’t hold against HALF of the ones who willingly have joined my efforts!”

“And yet I have somehow gained the advantage.”  He flared the staff again, drawing another whimper from his captive.  “Since you have clearly derailed all your efforts to hold us away from your castle for this...thing, and yet not for my dear Thazulok.”

The elf in question had run immediately to Myrdo, crouching next to the injured warrior, who was trying to wave him off with a murmured reassurance.  Hearing his name from the magister again caused him to look back in a sudden sharp fear, gripping at his own staff.  Myrdo sat up, reaching out to grasp at Thaz’s wrist, as though to steady both of them, before Thaz looked back at him, fussing for him to stop trying to get back up.  Josef hurried to join him, raising one hand over Myrdo and letting a faint blue glow emanate from his staff, working on healing the injuries, one eye still trained on what was happening in the confrontation.

“Our efforts are hardly derailed.  Most of your men are already dead or under our control.  Your attack has been a failure.”  Alma tightened her hold on her bow.  “Let him go and we will allow you to escape with your life.  Hurt him in any way and you will never leave this place.”

Danarius didn’t answer, shifting his staff enough to keep the warding shield between himself and them.  That minor shift was all that Cole needed, though, abruptly twisting in the larger man’s grasp, his free hand coming up to strike a palm against the mage’s forehead.

“Forget!”

Danarius did stagger back from that, a near-snarl leaving him as he dropped his staff to one side, and Cole immediately tried to bolt, ducking under Danarius’s arm.  His frantic escape came to a stop only a step later, colliding hard with the shield surrounding them, a look of concern crossing his face at the realization his freedom wasn’t quite so easily gained.

“Loghain!” Alma called out, but he was already gathering up the power himself, the Templar training she had insisted on called to the fore as he cast the energy forward, crashing against the shield to dispel it from their path.

The magister lashed out even as the spell was fading, hand snarling in the back of Cole’s shirt to yank him backwards again, spinning the staff in the other to brace the knife at the end against Cole’s throat.  “I don’t know what that was…” he growled, stepping backwards and dragging his hostage with him, trying to put distance between himself and the Templar energy disrupting his powers.  “But I have the feeling you tried to do something I would not have appreciated, had it worked.”

“You didn’t...you didn’t forget...why didn’t you forget??” Cole struggled, then yelped at the knife pressing harder against his throat, Danarius’s other hand gripping the back of his neck tightly to keep him from pulling away from it.

“I’ve figured this out now, Wardens,” Danarius said, the anger on his face not at all hidden behind the grin he offered.  “What you’ve got here.  A spirit, somehow, some way, alive and breathing like it were a human boy.  And however you’ve got it, it seems that you can’t stand the thought of losing it.”

“This isn’t supposed to happen!”  Cole tried to shove away the staff to no avail, a harsh pinch of blade slightly cutting into skin making him freeze, whimpering faintly in clear terror.  “You were supposed to forget!”

“It takes more than the likes of you, creature…”  Danarius chuckled darkly, looking back at Alma.  “Either strike or stand down, Warden.  Resume your battle or lay down your arms.”

“Do not!”  Cole was shaking where he stood, but he looked to Alma with wide eyes.  “Do not surrender to him, do not, do n-!”  He gasped as the knife twisted up slightly against his skin again, and a single thin line of blood oozed down the side of his neck.

“Myrdo.”

As this was going on, Josef’s magic eased away, taking the worst of the warrior’s pain with it, and Josef leaned in close, whispering into his ear.  Thaz frowned at that, wanting-irrationally, he knew, what with the current situation-to push the older man out of such an intimate range, but after only a few seconds, Josef had risen to his feet with a soft grunt, turning to hurry over to where Zhaana was standing beside Alma.

“What was that?” Thaz asked, as Myrdo shifted onto his feet, scowling, and the elf hesitantly got to his feet as well.  “Myrdo?”

Some worried expression flashed for only the barest instant across Myrdo’s face, before he turned, grabbing a fistful of the front of Thaz’s robe, yanking him forward and bellowing in what sounded enough like a rage.  “Danarius!  You want him, then take him!”

“Wh-what??”  Thaz gasped out as he was thrown to the ground in front of Danarius, just a few feet away, with Myrdo standing right above him.

“You would let this man threaten an innocent child, threaten me, the man you claim to love, to save your own skin??” Myrdo shouted, just glaring down at him.  “You run and hide behind others and have no courage to stand up and defend yourself!  You would let him destroy us all to save yourself!”

“Myrdo, what...no!”  Thaz couldn’t hide the wounded bewilderment on his face at the accusations, but he was aware of...something.  A tug at the back of his brain, a faint hint radiating from the emotions swirling about the group over him.  There was overwhelming fear coming through from most everyone, from their own group to the survivors of Danarius’s forces, a creeping incoherence of panic from Cole, anger from both the intruding mage and from Alma, a seething, twisting flame of incredulous rage from both at the sheer gall of the other keeping them from what they felt was their’s.  And from Myrdo, everything.  Panic of his own-better controlled but still there-fear, and anger...and guilt.

Thaz understood even in the moment that Myrdo was shoving at him again, still shouting at him.  “Your entire life you’ve given up others to save yourself!  You’ve given yourself over to men such as this to further your own horrid agendas and never cared what happened to the ones you stepped on to get what you wanted!”

“That’s not true!  It’s not, I-!”  Thaz glanced over to the rest of the group, who looked just as confused as he was sure he felt.  The bits of extra emotion coming from Myrdo gave him some indication that there was something more to this, but...the words themselves, the accusations and seeming fury behind them...

“Well, my little Thazulok, it seems as though you are up to your same old tricks, trying to make your way up in the world by attaching yourself to someone stronger.  Except this time you tried with a group who can recognize your power grabbing for what it is.  Even right up to the point of selecting one to offer a more...personal...favor?”  Danarius offered a blatantly false sympathetic smile to Myrdo.  “Yet another of his conquests, were you?”

“Speak not to me, magister,” Myrdo growled at him.  “You have what you came to retrieve.”  Another push at Thaz, shoving the seated elf forward with a rough foot to the back, leaving him sprawled in the snow again.  “Take him and be on your way.  You truly do not wish to anger a castle full of Wardens.”

“Wouldn’t I?”  Danarius glanced over the group assembled against him again.  “It seems I have already done such, doesn’t it?  But I suppose if you are willing to simply give me what I want without any further bloodshed on our parts…”

“Unhand Cole now, or you will receive nothing but a swift death,” Josef broke in.  “He is a spirit after all, and spirits can be corrupted under the sorts of duress you are putting him under.”

“I am aware of-,” Danarius said, before he stopped, glancing at Josef, frowning at the sight of a fresh line of blood dripping off the man’s fingertips...both hands.  “What are you-?”

“NOW, Zhaana!”

The two mages moved at the same time, Josef raising both hands and shoving down hard, and Danarius couldn’t stop the sudden intense pain of his arms being wrenched away from his hostage, the knife leaving Cole’s throat.  At the same instant, Zhaana was lashing out her hands as though to grab flies out of the air before her, and Cole let out a startled yelp when curls of magic clutched around him and yanked, pulling him forward and away from his captor.  She caught him before he could fall, lifting him bodily to cart him quickly away from the danger.  Loghain was quick to step in and take him, sitting in the snow to hang on to the shivering boy, as Alma rushed to his side instantly, already snatching an injury kit to press a bandage to his cut neck.

“Thazulok!”  Myrdo’s expression went from anger and disgust to determination, pointing forward at Danarius.  “Put a stop to this!”

Thaz turned his gaze from Myrdo and back to Danarius, who was already forcing off Josef’s blood magic with a ferocious sweep of his own staff, visibly staggering the healer mage at the strike back against his power.  Danarius looked as infuriated as Thazulok had ever seen him, more, beyond anything he had ever seen of the magister, save for the day he had fled from the man, escaped him and Tevinter...Danarius swearing all the way that he would reclaim what was his, no matter the cost, the distance to travel, that he would hound the elf to the gates of the Black City itself if need be.

And there was nothing between them.  Nothing to stop Danarius from reaching out and grasping at him, pulling him back in, dragging him back to Tevinter, back to slavery, to experimentation-

The scream that left him was intended to be a more frank denial.  A raging against the captor that had haunted him for years, who had come all this way and threatened those he had actually come to care about. It was supposed to be something eloquent, something befitting the way he carried himself, with a dignity and drama that defined who he was.  It was supposed to strike fear and shame into the heart of the cold monster that stood unchallenged for so long in all of his evil acts.

What it did was light aflame.

In some slightly less panicked corner of his mind, Thazulok couldn’t help but be alarmed that he seemed to be quite legitimately breathing out fire.  He had no idea how it was happening, what bit of power had opened up or reached into his grasp to pull on for such a thing to even be possible.  He was relatively sure that he wasn’t in complete control of it, that he certainly hadn’t consciously summoned it, but now that he knew it was coming, he wasn’t going to fight to push it away either.

The fire erupted from his hands, his mouth, the air around him igniting in a blast, unaware of how bright his already glowing eyes had become.  “You will not put your hands on me again!  Not ever again, do you hear me??  Never again!”

“Thazulok, don’t you dare-!” Danarius started, shifting his grip on his staff to ready his own spell.

“Never!!”

The flames exploded upwards, outwards, so fast and bright that the others behind Thaz had to shield their eyes or risk going blind.  Myrdo was sent backwards and into the snow again from the sheer concussive force of the blast.  Zhaana was remarkably quick to step in front of him, all of them, flinging her hands upwards so that a blue field appeared between them and the blast, just in time to direct the searing heat and force away, gritting her teeth at the sheer power.

“Get back!  I cannot hold this long!”

Josef scrambled forward, reaching out to put a hand between her shoulder blades, a red misty glow emanating around him and directing into her.  “I have you!  Hold the shield!  The rest of you move away!”

“Thazulok!”  Myrdo shouted, seeing through the shield that it looked as though there was nothing but a swirling tornado of fire spiraling horizontally forward, excess flames spilling away and to the sides and everywhere but through Zhaana’s protection.  He couldn’t see any sign of the elf mage, of any of Danarius’s forces, nothing but heat and flame.

“Come on, get moving!”  Loghain was fast to get to his feet, barely slowed by Cole’s weight, holding the boy tight against his side as he turned to run back towards the castle, Alma and Johanna right on his heels.  Zevran moved forward to grab hold of Myrdo’s arm and haul him backwards forcibly.

“There is nothing we can do, Myrdo, we must retreat!” Zevran was strong enough to drag the other man with him a few steps, before the reality set in for him, and in the next step Myrdo was swinging around, throwing his arms around Zevran, both of them vanishing in a burst of mist and reappearing at the stairs of the castle, just ahead of the others as they were arriving to take cover.

The two mages were moving slower, Zhaana keeping the fire held at bay as they slowly backed towards the castle, Josef guiding her direction.  The strain was showing on both of their faces, the work at holding back the seemingly unending fire, but they were finally able to get out of the range and let their magic drop, both gasping for breath as they joined the others, collapsing at the base of the stairs.

“Thazulok!”  Myrdo called out again, as the immense flames seemed to be slowly dispersing, though the snow in the clearing was all gone, and everything in any direction was scorched or still burning by itself.  Where Danarius and his forces had once been was nothing, save some powdery ash scattering along in the breeze retreating from the massive heat...a single half-destroyed staff and a few red-glowing metal bits of armor were the only hint anyone had ever stood before where Thaz now stood.

“Still hurts…” Cole spoke softly from where he was still being held by Loghain.  “Still in pain, still so afraid, so hurt, how could they do this how could he say those things to me, this isn’t the truth, this can’t be the truth…gone now, gone, but what’s left, what do I keep now...”

“Well that can’t be good,” Johanna said, looking back to the dwindling fireball, through which they could finally see a small elven shape, a bright blue glow evident even inside the fire.  “Uh.  So what do we do about the insane mage who just blew up an entire army?”

“He is hurting...he can’t draw it all back in, it’s trying to get out, trying to escape, trying to run, he wants so much to run again…”  Cole grimaced, putting his hands to his face, shaking his head hard.  “Want to get away, get away, get away…”

Myrdo shook his head, hurrying towards the figure standing there alone.  “Thazulok...it is over now,” he said softly.  “They’re gone, they are all gone.  You can stop.”

“Stay back from me…”  The fire had mostly subsided by this point, but there was still enough of an aura of pure heat around him that just coming near was uncomfortable.  The ground was barren and dry as a bone all around where Thaz had been standing, steam rising off from areas that the moisture hadn’t completely evaporated from yet.  Thaz’s posture was all tightness and fury, fists clenched, shoulders hunched, nothing but rage.

“Thazulok.  I am sorry that I caused you this fear.  We had to do something to stop Danarius from harming Cole, and you stopped him.  He is gone now.  That was from you.  You stopped him.  It’s over.  It’s all over now.”

“It can’t be...it can’t be, not like that, not...not just like that…”  Thazulok turned towards him, eyes gone completely blue, the miasma of his magic blending with lingering traces of dark blue flames.

“It is...look at what is left.  They’re gone.”  Myrdo started to reach out towards him.

“Don’t!”  Thaz drew back quickly, drawing back his hands as though to push the other man away.  “I could...I could keep this up, keep them from touching me, ever again, keep safe, finally safe for once…”

Myrdo paused for just a moment.  “Thazulok, you are safe.  I swear it.  You have destroyed Danarius, you left nothing of him but ashes.  You are safe.”  And without another word, Myrdo stepped closer, reaching out to grasp for Thazulok’s hand.

“Myrdo!”  Thazulok tried to pull back.  “You’re going to get burned!”

“I do not care.”  Myrdo grabbed at Thaz’s hand, ignoring the immediate sounds of the intense heat against flesh.  “You are safe now, Thazulok.  You saved us, you saved yourself, and this is over now.  Stop this.  Please.”

Thazulok glanced down at their hands, and with what looked like some effort, the waving flames pushed away from fingertips, down his arm.  He glanced back at where Danarius had been, where the slowly cooling remnants of what had once been an army remained on the charred ground.  And finally, slowly, the seething power flitted away, flames dissipating away into the air, the blue sheen in his eyes fading back to his normal lyrium-blue glow, and Thazulok just sort of slumped against Myrdo, clutching at him tightly, hiding his face against the warrior’s shoulder.

“He is so afraid, but...calm…” Cole murmured.  “And exhausted.  So exhausted…”

“But he is all right,” Myrdo said, not hesitating to reach down and scoop the mage elf into his arms, carrying him back towards the castle, frowning.  “What of the rest of you?”

Cole offered a small smile, even as Alma was already turning her attention back to bandaging the wound on his neck.  “I think everyone is fine,” she said a little briskly, but it was plain to see the relief in her posture at the realization.

“That was some impressive fireworks there, Thazzy,” Johanna said, whistling low as she surveyed the burned-dry courtyard.  “I think I see some armor bits we can scavenge though so maybe it wasn’t as thorough as you wanted.”

“It was thorough enough,” Myrdo said, glancing over as Josef reached out to casually touch his burned hand, letting enough healing magic into it to stop any festering wounds.  “That man will never threaten any of us again.”

“Yes,” Cole answered.  “He is gone now, for good.  This is all stopped as it should have been.”

“You’ll have to tell me more about this later, Cole,” Thazulok grumbled, rubbing at his face with one hand, noticeably not protesting Myrdo’s attentions.  “For now I think I would like to return to bed...perhaps for the day.”

Myrdo looked at Alma, who nodded, waving them on.  “Excellent work, all of you,” she said, standing, taking hold of Cole’s hands to pull him to his feet, one hand lingering on his wrist, reassuring herself of the spirit’s continued solidity.  “Zevran, if you could send a new message to Denerim to let them know we are well.”

“Right away,” he said, even though he moved instead to check on Loghain as the old soldier was getting to his feet himself.

“Everyone else, just...go rest, and when we have recovered our faculties, we will work on cleaning this up.”

She had barely finished the words when Myrdo was walking past her, back up the stairs towards the castle, only tightening his hold on Thazulok as he went.  For his part, the mage just sat up enough to wrap his arms around Myrdo’s neck, clutching, face hidden, but safe, safe from the part of his past that had tried to destroy them all.

****  
  



End file.
